


Exit Strategy

by SylvanWitch



Series: Proving the Exception [4]
Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: M/M, Soul Bond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-07
Updated: 2013-04-07
Packaged: 2017-12-07 17:38:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,908
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/751205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SylvanWitch/pseuds/SylvanWitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Now that the Third Bond has been consummated, there's no way out, right?  Or, Phil and Clint make a choice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Exit Strategy

They’ve got an hour to get cleaned up before the debriefing, which promises to be long and torturous and followed by individual and paired psych evaluations and any other Byzantine nonsense SHIELD intends to put them through.  In Medical, Fury was tight-lipped, a worried tension around his visible eye.  Hill was uncharacteristically hesitant as she filled out the initial report, asking standard questions in a stilted voice.  Sitwell hadn’t been able to make eye contact with Phil.  That might’ve been the worst sign of what was to come.

 

Right now, though, Phil isn’t thinking about professional repercussions.

 

They meet in the corridor outside Medical’s rear exit.  The area is dimly lit, a service and access hall, awash in a blood-tinged flush from the red exit signs.

 

They cast a hint of pink across Clint’s cheeks, and Phil feels his heart stutter in his chest at how beautiful Clint is.  He has to clench his fingers into fists to stop from touching him.

 

“It’s no use, sir,” Clint says, raising his eyes to take in Phil’s expression.  Phil sees his own helplessness mirrored in Clint’s look.

 

“No,” Phil agrees, but his voice comes out low and broken and rough, shocking a harsh, cut-off noise from Clint.

 

“We should go.”

 

It’s the best idea Clint’s had in years.

 

Phil would like their first (real) time—the first actual time doesn’t count because they had an audience and it was fuck-or-die and he couldn’t take his time or really appreciate any of it—to be after they’ve eaten and cleaned up.  

 

He’d like to stretch a warm, shower-damp Clint out on the soft navy sheets of his bed and work his way up from the delicate blue veins of Clint’s feet to the pulse that throbs reassuringly at his throat.

 

He’d like to suck at the hollow of Clint’s navel and nose his way along the crease of his thigh where it meets his pelvis.

 

He’d like to get to know, intimately and thoroughly, all of the places that make Clint sigh or moan or shriek with ticklish glee.

 

But the pressure in his core, the tight coil of need, the impossible strength of his desire is instead flattening his palm between Clint’s shoulders and urging him toward Phil’s office, which has a serviceable couch, heavy-duty biometric locks, and a security system voice override.

 

He doesn’t know if it’s sound-proof, but he expects that they’re about to find out.  

 

Once every measure has been taken to secure their privacy, Phil pauses just inside his door and rakes his eyes over Clint, who is standing in the narrow space between the couch and Phil’s desk, his hands clenching and releasing, clenching and releasing.  Here, in the color-stealing fluorescent light, he looks pale.  There’s a smudge of dirt on his temple, and his hair has dried into stiff furrows where he’d pushed his fingers through it after they’d recovered themselves on the cold concrete floor of the room in which they’d consummated the Third Bond in front of eight leering witnesses.

 

Clint looks strangely vulnerable for all that he also has a dangerous and heady desire in his eyes, and Phil forces himself to ignore the driving urgency of his need, pulls breath into his lungs and pushes it out slowly and deliberately, fighting for focus, for that centering, calm place he goes to when he’s about to enter a gun battle or infiltrate an enemy camp.

 

Clint’s not the enemy, of course, but desire might be.  Phil’s never felt quite as consumed as he does right now, wanting to close the space between himself and Clint, to strip Clint not just of his clothes and the weapons he secrets about his person but also every other thing between them:  Clint’s natural reserve, his fear of commitment, the scars he wears on his body and the ones he carries inside, where only Phil knows to look.

 

It’s this almost blind need to take Clint apart that, more than anything else, stops Phil.  If it were only his own lack of control to contend with, if it were only about struggling against a compulsion stronger than the involuntary need to breathe, he’d let it sink him under until it allowed him up again.

 

But this is about Clint, who is shaking, a subtle tremor along his skin that no one else would notice but that Phil would have seen even before he’d been able to feel the reaction echoing along his own skin.

 

“I’m okay, sir,” Clint says, voice grating like he’s fucked out, like he’s been choking on cock for hours.  Phil has to close his eyes against the way Clint’s voice pulls against his skin like a touch.

 

“Phil,” Clint says then, correcting himself, his tone forcing Phil’s eyes open.  Clint’s hands open and close, open and close, as if, bereft of a bowstring, he doesn’t know how to take aim at this particular target.  “It’s okay.  I’m good.  We’re good.”

 

It’s probably the closest either of them is going to come to a declaration of intent, so Phil lets it be enough to move him the final three steps across the office.  He takes Clint’s face between his hands, as much to control the way he wants to plunder Clint’s mouth as to keep Clint from taking command of the kiss.  

 

But control is an illusion here, Phil quickly realizes, because as soon as their lips touch, the Third Bond unfurls inside of him, a lightning heat that sets his nerves on fire.  He’s hard in an instant, dizzy with it.  

 

Clint makes a startled sound into Phil’s mouth and then their hands are busy divesting each other of what clothing is left to them:  Clint’s filthy tee-shirt and torn BDUs (his boxers having been lost to impromptu clean-up after their rescue); Phil’s dress shirt (stripped of buttons when this Bond had been consummated), his pants, and his shoes, toes scuffed from gaining purchase against the cement floor when he’d pushed himself inside Clint.  

 

Now, Phil pushes Clint into the desk hard enough that the heavy metal legs gouge a two-inch path into the industrial carpet.  Clint grunts, spreads his legs, wraps an ankle around Phil’s thigh.  Their cocks are leaking, but the skin still catches against the calluses of Clint’s hand where he wraps it around them both and starts an unsteady rhythm that punches stifled moans out of Phil.

 

Clint growls into Phil’s ear, “I want to fuck you over this desk,” and Phil gives up trying to be quiet.

 

Soon enough, Clint’s reversed their positions, turned Phil over the desk, pressed a dry digit into Phil’s hole.  It burns, unprepared as he is, and Phil welcomes the pain for the way it clears his mind enough to consider what’s about to happen here.  

 

He should care that Clint is technically his subordinate.  That fucking once, under duress, is mission-acceptable but following their desire now means something else entirely.  That everyone at the debriefing will smell sex on them and know that they didn’t spend their hour cleaning up.

 

Phil doesn’t care, and that’s enough to force the words out.  “Wait.  Stop.”

 

Clint pulls away like he’s been tazed, and Phil resists a shudder as the icy chill of Clint’s retreat registers along the sweaty skin of his back.  He pushes himself upright, knees shaking, and turns around.

 

Clint’s a vision of debauchery, chest flushed, mouth kissed red and wet, cock hard and dripping.  Phil closes his eyes, but it doesn’t help to quell his need; he can smell Clint, smell his heat and sweat and musk.

 

He shakes his head and opens his eyes.  “I want this,” he says, and if the words weren’t evidence enough, his voice bears testament:  He’s strangled with breathlessness, choking on the effort to keep a distance between them.

 

“But I need to know we can walk away from this if we have to,” Phil says.  “I need to know you can leave if you need to.  This can’t be...”  

 

Binding?  Permanent?  Forever?  

 

There aren’t any words for what’s between them now, and it takes the last of Phil’s strength to keep the space between them when what he really wants is to be covered by Clint, held down by him.  Owned.

 

Whatever resistance Phil had warehoused, all the years of denying himself what he’s wanted, have come to this moment.  He’s asking Clint to be strong enough for the both of them.

 

Phil sees Clint taking in Phil’s state, watches recognition bloom in his eyes.  “I’ve always got an exit strategy, sir.”

 

“And what is your means of egress on this one, Barton?”  Hope wars with regret in Phil’s gut, and he holds his breath, waiting for Clint to give them an out.

 

Clint smiles and shrugs, says, “Death,” like it’s an everyday word, and for them it is.  In their line of work, it’ll come sooner rather than later, but it will come, unavoidable and more permanent even than this Bond.

 

“That’s a rather radical strategy, Agent,” Phil comments at last.  He’s proud of the way his voice wavers only a little, though still at a lower register than usual.

 

“Situational assessment,” Clint responds, managing to indicate by the briefest of gestures their mutual tumescence, the scent of sex in the room, the flush of lust painting both of their chests and somehow too the indefinable, invisible, overwhelming bond spooled around their hearts and tugging.

 

“This changes—.”

 

“Nothing, sir.  Phil.”  

 

And Phil means to call bullshit.  He means to point out all the obvious ways that getting willfully naked and fucking each other in his office at SHIELD headquarters is clearly a change.

 

Except Clint’s right.

 

They’ve been feeling this way a long time, longer than the Third Bond, than any magical nonsense in fact.  

 

Before even the First Bond, there’d been the safehouse in Dubuque, when Phil had sewn a delicate line of stitches into Clint’s inner thigh and had to stop his hands from trembling by reciting baseball stats in his head.

 

There’d been Kiev, where Phil had been shot, and Caracas, where Clint had been stabbed, and St. Kitt’s, where they’d both almost drowned, and the shark tank in Queensland that doesn’t bear remembering.

 

And there’d been pie in a diner in East Nowhere, Minnesota, cherry smear like a bloodstain at the corner of Clint’s mouth.

 

The fog of their breath in a nondescript sedan as they’d shared “coldest I’ve ever been” stories on a stakeout in Fargo, Phil tracing a map of McMurdo AFB on the inside of the windshield under the rearview.

 

Clint’s voice, strained from holding on, a miracle in Phil’s ear as he spots the archer hanging by one arm from a cliff face and directs the chopper pilot in for a rescue, Clint saying, “You’re late, sir,” like he’d never doubted Phil’s arrival.

 

Clint’s hand around his wrist as he’d pulled Phil from the edge of a collapsing skyscraper.

 

Clint’s pulse under his tongue as he’d invoked the Second Bond to keep the blood flowing there.

 

Clint’s thighs strong around him, hands hard on his shoulders as he’d sworn and writhed through the Third Bond under Phil’s punishing thrusts.

 

“Jesus,” Phil breathes then, and whether it’s profanity or prayer hardly matters.  There’s revelation in it and surrender and he’s reaching toward Clint, who’s gripping Phil by the shoulders and turning him around, pushing him not ungently toward the couch, onto which Phil sinks without a thought for how it makes him look—on his hands and knees, forearms flat to the cushion, ass in the air.

 

Phil feels Clint’s weight behind him seconds before Clint’s hands telegraph his purpose and then there’s a hot wet tongue against his hole and Phil’s crying out, eyes winched closed, breath caught in his throat as he swallows a shout.

 

“God, Clint, fuck!” he manages, and he swears he can feel Clint’s grin against his skin.  The tongue pierces him, relentless, and he’s shaking, sure to come apart before Clint can even come inside.  Clint is thorough and filthy, lewd words mouthed along the back of his thigh as he reaches between Phil’s leg and captures leaking pre-come from his aching cock, moves back to Phil’s hole, slides tongue and a finger inside him together.

 

“Clint,” he warns, and it’s the last coherent word from him as Clint’s tongue is replaced by a second finger, all stretch and burn, and then a third, which punches a grunt out of him and then a string of dry, breathless sounds that wring a similar noise out of Clint.

 

Clint’s hand bruising his hip is the only warning Phil gets for Clint’s cock nudging bluntly into him, the stuttering, slow drag of intrusion suddenly eased by how much Phil wants this and by the echo of Clint’s own pleasure that Phil can feel in blood and breath and bone.

 

He’d somehow expected that their Bond would make them weaker, that sharing this with Clint would unman them both, not double but halve their respective strength.  

 

He was wrong.

 

Their coming together is like the light of a distant home-fire, beacon of a bastion that promises a last stand against the enemy in close pursuit.

 

It’s a cold night broken by the bulk of an impassable mountain at your backs as you hunker down shoulder to shoulder, awaiting the first grey light of dawn to confront the invading army that has you trapped.

 

It’s a sword arm that swings in counter to your own, a havoc cry against an unexpected sally, a heaving back bracing you as you thrust and dodge and parry.

 

There’s no pain now, all discomfort obliterated by  the electric contact of live-wires lighting Phil up as Clint strikes a spot inside of him, driving the last panting breath out of him as he comes hard enough that he stops breathing, hard enough that he’s convinced the blood rushing in his head is going to kill him.  

 

Then Clint is making an animal sound, groaning his release as he seats himself deep and lets go.  There’s a rush of heated understanding, of coming back to himself to feel Clint’s seed seeping out around his softening cock, but even the unpleasantness of Clint pulling away is soothed by a sense that this is right where they’re supposed to be.

 

When they’ve gathered themselves enough to stand unassisted, they hand each other the tattered remains of their clothes, fingers trailing light touches, taking advantage of bare skin whenever they can.  They linger over a kiss, tender and wet, tongues sloppy with satiation.

 

Clint’s grin glistens when he at last pulls away and says, “Fury’s gonna be pissed.”

 

They’re ten minutes late for the briefing, but whether it’s their posture, their expressions, or their obvious post-coital state, something catches Fury’s anger and keeps it behind his teeth.  Instead of the dressing down they expect, they get a long, drawn-out sigh as the Director sinks wearily into his chair and gestures that they should also be seated.

 

“You’ll have to be reassigned,” he starts.

 

Their “No sir” in unison is neither disrespectful nor hesitant.

 

Fury throws his hands up.  “The regs are clear, agents.  I shouldn’t even let you stay on.”

 

“The regs are antique, sir,” Clint answers.  

 

“He’s right,” Phil offers after the moment of tense silence has drawn the air in the room tight.  “Sir, if I may, I think this might be an opportunity to test an experimental partnership parameter.”

 

Fury’s eyebrow quirks, which is as much rope as the Director is going to give Phil to hang them both.

 

“The protocols were established in a time when socio-cultural pressures asserted that Bonding was obsolete.  It was unpopular to suggest such a…permanent…connection between partners.  There was a lot of talk at the time about free will and sexual servitude and gender politics. But the origins of Bonding, historically speaking, were in a time when having a Bondmate to literally watch your back in battle ensured the safety and effectiveness of both partners.  There are accounts—in Pliny, Plotinus, Marcus Aurelius—of warriors with extraordinary strength, enhanced healing abilities—which we’ve already seen—almost telepathic communication of intentions.  We could be an enormous asset to SHIELD…”

 

“More than we already are, that is,” Clint adds with a mild smirk.

 

“You could also be a monumental liability, too” Fury argues, ticking his points off on his fingers, “Conflict of interest, confusion of duty on dangerous missions, distraction of proximity.”

 

“Simultaneous understanding of situational context,” Clint counters.

 

“Split-second reaction to threats on two or more fronts,” Phil continues.

 

“Fantastically mind-blowing, anatomically improbable sex,” Clint concludes.

 

Fury throws his hands up again, this time in surrender.

 

“You fuck this up, it’ll be both your asses.  Antarctica will look like a picnic ground compared to where I’ll send you.  We clear?”

 

“Yes, sir,” they answer, standing up, shoulders just touching as they face the Director across his imposing desk.

 

“And go take a shower.  You stink like a Turkish bathhouse after the fleet’s been in for a week.”

 

Phil studiously avoids thinking about how the Director might have hit upon that particular knowledge.  There are some things better left undiscovered.

 

“My shower at home is bigger,” Phil murmurs as they pass the open door to Hill’s office.  She makes a point of not looking at them as they pass.

 

“Mine’s closer,” Clint answers, just as quietly.

 

“You win.”

 

“ _We_ do.”

 

That’s true. 

**Author's Note:**

> What started as a one-shot became, at the encouragement of some very kind readers, a series of stories exploring the nature of the soul bond as it's described in "Won't Happen Again." While this part of the story arc is complete, I'm envisioning one-shots from the post-Third-Bond storyverse, in which we get to see the ordinary and extraordinary in the lives of these unusual Bondmates who defy all expectations and prove, as the series title suggests, the exception to the rule.


End file.
